Visual Elements in 'The Piano'

In the scene beginning at 01:43:44, where Ada and George set sail for Nelson, shot sizes are used for various reasons. The scenes uses an establishing shot at 01:44:19 to communicate with the audience clearly the nature and set up of the scene. This particular shot is a tacking shot and it starts with a close up on a Maori woman’s face as she sings a farewell waiata. The shot then zooms out from the woman gradually to reveal the men pushing the waka into the sea. The shot reveals the establishment of the scene in an aesthetically pleasing way. The dramatic movement of the camera from the close-up to an establishing shot matches the movement of the waka through the sand in a flowing way. The use of a tracking shot here also focuses the viewer on the Maori woman as she sings her melancholy waiata, emphasising the fact that the characters are leaving the place they had called their home. The final part of the tracking shot really displays the big wide ocean that the characters are sailing into, this is to highlight the fact that they are going into an unknown, something big and mysterious. However, this is not presented in a frightening way because of the warm lighting from the sunset. 

The film also uses close up shots in the scene, particularly when they are rowing the waka across the sea. The use of close up shots in this scene does two things, it focuses the viewer on the emotions of the characters, and makes the boat feel cramped.  One example of these close up shots in the scene is the shot at 1:46:10. In this shot Ada looks at her piano falling into the water, and contemplates her suicide. The shot has a clear back ground, middle ground, and fore ground. In the background we see a Maori paddling the waka, the middle ground (where the focus is) is Ada, and the foreground is a man dealing with the ropes after pushing the piano overboard. The inclusion of so many thing in a close up shot, creates a cramped feeling for the audience. All of the moving, in one close up shot, really make the shot feel busy and tightly packed. This look is probably reflective of how the main character, Ada is feeling. I imagine she is feeling claustrophobic and suffocated. Maybe she is feeling claustrophobic and suffocated not just from the canoe but from her circumstances in general. From being forced to marry a man, to being shipped to a foreign country her circumstances are less than desirable. By making the canoe suffocatingly full, Campion may be symbolising the suffocating Ada does a few seconds later when she drowns. Her suffocated feeling is reiterated through the use of the close up to focus the viewer on Ada’s face. With the close up, we can see in detail the emotion on Ada’s face. This is important as Ada is having an internal existential crisis as she ponders her suicide. The audience is able to sense the drama on her face, and the use of a close up shot intensifies that effect because it is so large on screen.

The film is edited very slowly; it has a lingering and thoughtful pace. The pace slows the action down and gives the film a sense of realness, but in an awkward way. A critic once said of Campion’s work, that it conveys “the reality of experience”, and I think a huge component of that is the editing pace. The film has quite a considerable number of seconds on each shot, making the film seem very slow. The action seems slower because the dialogue takes longer. But this gives the film the “reality of experience. It makes the film seem more real because the editing pace allows the characters to take long pauses and ponder the actions that have been taken and wonder about the ones they’ll take next. This is much like how real life is, dialogue doesn’t flow and people don’t know how to react to things. The lingering pace gives the film genuineness and it brings the audience in to the world of the film.  Because it is more like real life, the actions taken by the characters seem more significant to members of the audience. Thusly they are more hurt or happier when things go one way or another. The lingering pace also makes the audience feel a little uncomfortable. Audiences are used to the standard fast paced and action heavy films, so the slow pace of the piano is a contrast for the Audience and it feels a little awkward. This stiff feeling, makes the Audience feel how Ada is feeling in the film, uncomfortable. She is thrust into a new, somewhat twisted society and she is a little bit of an outcast, subsequently she feels uncomfortable for most of the film. We are able to see how Ada is reacting to the scene through the editing pace. An example of the lingering pace is at 1:33:50 after Alisdair cuts of Ada’s finger and she is attempting to hold herself together. The camera lingers on Ada as she limps around in the mud holding her bloody wound. It spends several seconds looking straight onto her wound and her face. By having the camera spend so much unbroken time on her the audience is forced to look at her suffering face; creating an awkward feeling in the audience.

Mise en Scene of 'The Piano' - Setting

In the film, setting plays an important part. The harsh cold environment of the west coast of the south island make Ada feel isolated and daunted in her new home. The time period means that the characters have to endure tough and dirty conditions, which creates an unpleasant feeling in the film. In this particular scene, however, the setting adds to the harsh reality of the scene. The setting is in a clearing in the New Zealand woods, the place is an unpleasant place to be. It is filled with mud and mire, created by the torrential rain that soaks the characters and their clothes, the fallen trees whose leaves branches stick out of the logs as broken shanks. All this culminates in the setting being a horrible place. The grimness of the place results in an increased gloomy tone for the film. The mud in the scene makes the characters feel uncomfortable; the dirty environment matches the despair of the scene. The audience react to the mire with repulsion, much how they react to the violence in the scene. The rain burdens the characters and makes them feel worn out. The rain, symbolically, means sadness or grievance, and the scene certainly has a lot of that.  The rain makes the scene feel cold, which, along with the blue lighting, gives the scene an icy intense feel. The fallen trees create darkness in the scene aesthetically. At 01:33:50, there are trees lying in the mud with broken branches protruding from the log like spikes. These violent looking things put a mood of brutality in the scene, which the audience reacts negatively too. All of these features combined make the scene more severe and harder to watch. This adds to what the scene is trying to say because, by making the scene dark and harsh, the film is condemning and regretting the action in the scene.  It is criticising the oppression of women by highlighting the most obvious example of Alisdair’s mistreatment of his wife and emphasising how wrong it is through setting and mise en scene in general.

 

Mise en Scene of 'The Piano' - Performance

The performances in the scene really heighten the drama and the sadness. The two lead actresses both give very good performances and both won Oscars for their work. Her performance in the film overall is phenomenal. The amount and range of emotion Hunter is able to show through her character, despite her character’s silence is incredible. Her detailed performance shows, as well as Ada’s emotions, the depth of Ada as character, which makes the film a more interesting watch. Both these effect are generated in this scene. Initially, Hunter’s portrays Ada as very calm and relaxed in the scene. At 01:32:32 Ada looks peaceful as she sits and reads her book. However, this provides sudden juxtaposition a second later when Alisdair storms through the house and ploughs his axe through the book. When this happens Hunter’s face goes immediately into shock and terror, which gives a huge and instant contrast to her relaxed face just a few seconds earlier. Her performance develops further into the scene, when she pulls away from Alisdair as he drags her through the mud. The desperation of Ada’s face is evident, as she fights to get away from her husband. We see her struggle in a midshot at 1:33:18. The way the film focuses on her in the scene, through shot size and screen time, forces the Audience to see Ada’s desolation. Making the audience grimace, her distressed performance in the scene makes it even harder to watch. Because Ada was seen fighting off her husband instead of letting herself be dragged along by her abusive husband, the performance shows Ada as a strong-willed woman, not willing to be pushed around. This characterization is a criticism by the writer/director Jane Campion of gender roles in society. While women are somewhat expect to be submissive and compliant, Ada is a headstrong independent woman. Anna Paquin gave the other Oscar winning performance in the scene, as Ada’s young daughter, Flora. Flora is another female that doesn’t fit into the expected role of a woman in society. Flora is a lippy, bold girl, not the quiet and meek person women were expected to be. Paquin’s portrayal of the cheeky Flora, as she goes from innocent child to tormented one, gives the film a grievous tone. Flora is initially performed, in the film, as an innocent sinless girl. However, in this scene the audience sees her innocence tarnished. Flora wails as her mother is abused in a close-up at 1:33:39. Even if only briefly, this shot focuses the audience’s attention on Flora’s misery. We can see close up Paquin’s face as she screams and her eyes water. This part of the scene is truly heart-breaking, through the performance here; the audience is able to see the consequences of Alasdair’s violence. The added despair of the scene, from Paquin’s performance reinforces the idea that women shouldn’t be expected to fall into gender roles. The dark, sombre tone of the film is a condemnation of gender roles and is reflective of Ada’s sadness as she is forced into gender stereotypes, and this tone is emphasised through Paquin’s performance. 

Mise en Scene of 'The Piano' - Costume

The costume in the film and in the scene is also important; they inform and remind the audience about what kind of time period the film is set in. Some costumes are more significant than others; particularly, Ada’s dress. Ada’s dress becomes a symbol of her and other womens’ oppression. The dress is a painful, uncomfortable thing that Ada is forced to made to wear by society. The dress comes to represent Ada’s cage, but she also uses it as protection. Not only does she uses it to keep her and her daughter warm at one point in the film, but it also shows her refusal to be affectionate, particularly to her husband. It becomes a barrier and she chooses who is allowed to come in and who is not. This symbolism is apparent in this scene as well when at 01:33:26 Alisdair tries to rip open her dress but she fights him off. In the scene, Ada is dressed in black. Perhaps this is condemnation for her adultery. Her daughter however, is wearing all-white and angel wings. This is symbolic of her innocence and her righteousness, since she did the proper thing to do and didn’t condone her mother’s affair. However, her clothes soon become dirtied in the scene. This represents her dissolving feeling of nobility as she sees what her actions are being done to her mother. This climaxes when she is sprayed with her mother’s blood. Both her and her mother Ada are gradually covered with dirt in the scene. At 01:33:39 there is a clothes up of Ada’s muddy hands. Seeing the two main and most likable character covered in dirt creates a feeling of discomfort in the audience. It adds to the horror of the scene.  It further emphasises the bleakness of the scene and the sadness experienced by the characters.

Mise en Scene of 'The Piano' - Lighting

The lighting in the scene is very gloomy, the scene uses mostly grey and some blue tones. The filmmakers possibly have used a filter to make the lighting more monochrome. While other parts of the film have warm colours and lighter tones, this scene is particularly dark and grey. This emphasises the emotion of the misery of the scene. It further hammers home how bleak the scene is and what it represents in a wider sense. These dreary colours add to the tone of darkness, not only in this scene but in the film overall. They symbolise the sadness in the scene, the film, and the characters. This is very different from other romantic films, making the film seem even darker and more brutal. The dark tones are a representation of the dark and heavy themes in the film, such as spousal abuse, women’s rights, adultery, and gender roles. While it may be stylized, the lighting is naturalistic in the scene. This wasn’t chosen thematically as such, but instead to give a realistic look to the scene, as it is occurring outside. The naturalistic lighting is, however, used to create a dramatic effect. At 01:32:11 in the film Alisdair is running through the forest with an axe, the camera pans through the forest following him with trees cutting in front of the camera. The trees are silhouetted and the contrasting tones of the black trees shadows in the foreground and the light clouds in the background create a dramatic effect. This juxtaposition is very striking to the audience and could possibly make an audience member anticipate the climax that is about to occur. 

Intro to Mise en Scene of 'The Piano'

‘The Piano’ uses Mise en Scene to create various tones throughout the film. Mise en scene is how the cinematographer or the director frames the shot and everything in it. It is particularly prevalent in the scene happening at 01:32:02. In this scene Alisdair hacks off Ada’s finger with an axe after he learns she has seen George again against his orders. The scene is a very important and is, depending on how you look at it, the climax of the film. Through lighting, costume, props and performance the scene creates an impacting scene by the means of mise en scene.

Sound in the film 'The Piano'

The film ‘The Piano’ makes effective use of the convention sound. Ironically, for a film named after a musical instrument, the film uses a lot of silence. One such use is in the scene where Ada goes to see George for the last time and the room scene is silent except for George’s quiet monologue about their relationship (11:11:28). The silence creates and eerie and suspenseful tone. It is suspenseful in the sense that the audience doesn’t know the intentions of the characters or what their actions will be, and the silence builds on this suspense because the audience isn’t given any hints through music or sound effects. The silence builds a dark tone because it makes the scene feel very raw. Although the stripped-down nature of the sound in the scene doesn’t blatantly imply macabre tones, the silence feels very creepy and strange. This is because it breaks the convention of the usual swelling score in romance scenes. The Piano gives the audience a bare, naked scene, instead of something where the music does the thinking for them. This strikes the audience as peculiar and eerie. But the film and its main character Ada are peculiar and eerie, and the use of silence demonstrates that. The strange and unconventional of the silence in the scene makes the audience feel uncomfortable, through the silence and the broken dialogue. Ada is probably also feeling uncomfortable in the scene, so the use of silence helps relate Ada’s feelings to the audience. It creates a sense of awkwardness and realness in the scene; the silence makes the film feel more realistic because silence is not something you usually hear in a film. It adds to the format of the slow lingering pace the film has because it draws out the dialogue and slows down the action. The silence in the film may represent Ada’s silence which in turn represents the silencing and oppression of the women across the world. In general, the silence adds to the overall dark and moody tone of the film.

The film also uses music to carry effect. Most of the films score is just piano music, which, of course, relates to the film as the piano is a motif. However, this doesn’t hinder the range of emotional impact from the score. The piano music can matches the happy mood of the scene at 01:49:38, and the dramatic and romantic mood of the scene at 01:15:13. The diverse moods of the piano music help the audience feel the various tones of the scenes and the emotions of the characters. Particularly Ada, whose perspective the film follows most of the time, because the piano is descrived as her voice. Ada says “I don’t think myself silent. That is because of my piano”. So it follows that the tone of the piano would reflect her emotions in a lot of the film. Where Ada is unable to express herself, both physically and in society, we get to see into her soul through the film and the music. It helps us see how Ada is ignored and how she is empowered. A lot of the music is diegetic, which is quite unusual for a film. The further emphasises how the music is reflective of Ada’s feelings as she is creating the music. The diegetic and simple music also helps the film stay grounded. It makes the film more grounded. It makes the film seem more disciplined as the music is more realistic. The very raw simple score adds to the dark tones of the film. This breaks the convention of the standard romance films’ score. These scores are generally orchestral, fickle and climactic. But the score of The Piano is different; it furthers itself from a standard romance film through the score.

'Black Swan' Character Study

The main character in the film is Nina; the film follows her descent into madness at the hands of her perfectionism. In the world of professional ballet, Nina is not passionate about dance, but about being perfect. She wants to get all of the moves and choreography perfectly correct; she is not interested in giving a sentimental or fervent performance. This trait is represented when Thomas says to Nina that he sees her ‘obsessed getting each and every move perfectly right but I never see you lose yourself.’ Her perfectionism is driven by her over bearing mother, who ‘gave up her career to have her’. Nina’s mother was never satisfied with her and as a result Nina is never satisfied with herself. While it is not blatantly stated, it is implied that whether aggressively or passively Erica forced Nina to be a dancer and is attempting to live her career through Nina. When Nina tells her she got the role of the swan queen, Erica talk about that from her perspective, ‘MY daughter the swan queen’. But the biggest and darkest effect of her mother on her is Nina’s paranoia; Nina lives her life in anxiety. This is presumably because of her over protective mother. Erica has kept Nina in a watchful and possessive shell her whole life, and consequently Nina is fearful of everything. This is portrayed in the Mise en scene and the music of the film, by having everything except Nina as darker, more threatening and more dramatic the audience is able to see Nina’s anxiety. In particular, Nina fears that there is something following her, later it revealed that the evil thing following her shadow, her evil twin. This idea is portrayed through the visual elements of the film, the ever present hand held tracking shot from Nina’s back gives the audience the suspicion that there is something or someone following Nina. The film also uses special effects to build on this Idea, the film shows Nina’s hallucinations through this convention. The audience is able to see Nina hallucinating about other people having her face, or her reflection in the mirror moving. This allows the audience to see deep into Nina’s perspective, we are fully aware of what she is thinking and how she is paranoid.

Her paranoia consumes her when she is cast as the role of the black swan, and in order to be perfect like she wants she must “lose herself” in the role. Her desire to be perfect results in a total transformation into the black swan. She becomes very fearful of Lily trying to sabotage her, which results in a hallucination of Nina killing her. She wants to be like her idol Beth, who Thomas describes as “perfect” but also say that “everything Beth does comes from within. From some dark impulse. I guess that's what makes her so thrilling to watch. So dangerous. Even perfect at times, but also so damn destructive.” In the film, Nina’s dark impulse is personified, as her evil twin shadow, and in some ways Lily. This twin is purely a figment of Nina’s imagination, but she is still very afraid of her twin and that the doppelganger will take over her body. Eventually it does, Nina is totally changed into her sinister counterpart, her black swan. She has gone totally insane and the meek girl we knew is gone. We can see her insanity, her hallucinations through special effects, Nina’s eyes are reddened to be like a swan’s near the end of the film, her skin is seen to have huge rippling goose bumps that feathers eventually protrude from, and her arms metamorphosize into black wings during her performance. All this helps draw the conclusion that Nina has become the black swan. Changes are shown through Nina’s actions, she rebels against and attacks her mother, she becomes sexually liberated and she takes drugs at a nightclub. Her mental instability causes her to hallucinate that her doppelganger is trying to strangle her, Nina stabs her doppelganger with a shard of glass from a broken mirror. Of course, her doppelganger being herself she actually just stabs herself, it is later revealed.  Her death is symbolic as the culmination of the fight between good and evil inside her. The meek and fearful girl, the white swan, and the seductive careless girl, the black swan, fight each other, like in the scene at 1:29:05, and even fraternize and seduce each other, like in the scene at 1:05:27, all inside Nina's head. Eventually, their ardent relationship culminates in the murder of one and other and thusly the death of Nina. The way Nina forces herself to be consumed by the black swan shows her dedication to the role, the depth of her desire to be perfect. She is so dedicated to the role she is willing to die to get it perfect. This is shown when Nina is lying on her deathbed and all she has to say is: “I was perfect”. 

Mise En Scene in 'Black Swan'

Mise En SceneMise en Scene in the film is very important; it is highly stylized and very aesthetic. Almost everything in the film is black white or grey, and sometimes even red. This idea is particularly evident in the convention costume. Arronofsky uses costume as symbolism in a pretty conspicuous way. White and light grey clothes meaning the character is good, and black and dark grey clothes meaning bad. This idea is present in one of the opening scene, where Nina is riding a subway to the dance studio. The scene occurs at 4:59, in it, Nina is dressed in a pale pink coat, while everyone else on the train and on the street is dressed in black. It symbolises Nina being surrounded by darkness, she is constantly being swayed by the ways of those around her. It emphasise Nina, as she is isolated from the rest of the people in the scene, to reiterate the idea that Nina is pure, good and right. Her doppelganger in the film is always dressed in black. This shows her as an dark reflection of Nina, as the ‘evil force that is pulling’ her towards insanity. Her enemy in film, Lily, is dressed in black the whole film, which juxtaposes Lily and Nina. Not only are her clothes black, but Nina’s makeup, hair and skin are all darker than Nina. This depiction makes the audience suspicious of her as character, they suspect she is somehow evil or trying to get Nina; which is much how Nina feels about Lily. The audience is able to relate more to Nina through costume.  Nina goes from wearing all white at the start of the film and gradually she starts to wear more greys, then dark greys, until finally when she performs as the black swan dressed in all black. This progressive change represents Nina’s change in character; she goes from being a stressed, pure, meek girl into the paranoid, insane, forward and independent black swan. When she is wearing black, the audience can see Nina’s new similarities to the black-clad Lily.  As Nina is seduced and sabotaged by Lily, we see Lily on her downward spiral to insanity. The similarities between the two characters are reinforced at the end of the film when the colour of their costumes is the same. The audience is able to see these changes, not just through performance, but through the costume. The use of black being good and black being bad is relevant to the film because it also used in Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, which is performed in the film. This symbolism is classic and is used across many films. But the use of it in Black Swan is immediately connected to swan lake. The costume builds on the idea that whole film is a ballet. That the drama of Nina’s life is the same as that of a ballet, this idea is drawn with of the use of Tchaikovsky’s music and it is developed through costume. The correlation between the use of costume in the ballet being performed, Swan Lake, and in the rest of the film, ties the film together and unifies it as a whole piece.

A monochrome colour scheme is also used in the setting for Black Swan. Almost all of the film’s setting a done in grey scale, with a few exceptions. All of the sets not only used greyscale, but put light and dark tones right next to each other to create contrast. The striking juxtaposition of the tones creates a highly dramatic effect and makes for a very aesthetically pleasing look. The inclusion of this look in almost all of the setting makes the look highly stylised. Using this look across the board gives the film a very dark look. The sets are very creepy; they make the audience feel unnerved because of their dark and conflicting tones. One such example is at 34:37, where Nina visits Thomas’s apartment. His apartment is decorated with black furniture and ornaments, contrasting with the white walls of his apartment. The decorations of the apartments are interesting, there is an abstract statue of a tree, whose thin spindly leafless branches and their long shadow look very creepy. The sinister look comes from the branches seeming to creep into the white space gradually; in a similar way to Nina’s gradual fall into insanity and blackness. This menacing object, shown at the start of the scene set the mood for the scene. It lets the audience now the nature of the scene as Thomas probes unwelcomely into Nina’s sex life. The scene also contains a Rorschach painting hung on his wall. The Rorschach painting, as well as creating a dramatic effect with conflicting tones, relates to the film thematically because it is, essentially psychoanalysis of the main character. The inclusion of this piece makes the audience increasingly suspicious of Nina’s mental state. In the scene, being at the start of the film, the audience doesn’t know the extent of her craziness, but it is hinted at through the painting. The many blacks used in the sets of the film represent the hostile environment Nina is in, or rather the hostile environment that she feels she is in. She is a consistently anxious girl, and she feels she is constantly in danger. The film follows her perspective; it is built through Nina’s eyes, so it follows that the outer world would be portrayed as dark, scary and dramatic because that is how Nina sees it.

The lighting in the film is mostly fairly standard, naturalistic lighting, somewhat diffused with no real effect for most of the film. However, it is broken occasionally, specifically when they are performing on stage. An instance of interesting lighting is in the opening scene at 1:14. This scene is Nina’s dream, it is the first example of the film blurring reality and imagination; It is a hint at the hallucinations to come. The lighting in this scene is from a single consistent spotlight, non-naturalistic lighting. The single light source protruding the otherwise jet black space creates a highly dramatic effect. The audience is completely arrested by the stark white ballerina dancing in a totally black space. The juxtaposition grabs a hold of the audience’s attention, which is important as this is the opening scene. It also sets the tone for the film as a dark, moody, dramatic production. The lighting is also symbolic; the white light represents Nina being a pure, gentle, timid girl. While the complete blackness surrounding her represents the danger she thinks she is in. Her over protective mother has made Nina a paranoid person, she is always worried about her surrounding and lighting is a metaphor for that.

Use of sound in 'Black Swan'

The music in the film Black Swan is used to create effect. The film’s score is mostly ballet music, composed by Clint Mansell and based off of the music of Tchaikovsky. This style of music is significant in the film because it is about ballet; this idea is furthered through the continued use of diegetic music. The diegetic music help tie the film together, by showing the sources of the music in the film intermittently. It is specifically about Tchaikovsky’s ballet, Swan Lake, it then follows that the music in film ought to be similar to that of Tchaikovsky. The music is performed sometimes with a full orchestra and other times stripped down with just one or two instruments; the violin and the piano. However, despite the sometimes raw nature of the score, the music is always dramatic. The violent music reflects the intense tone present throughout the whole film. The film gives us break when there is no music, but when there is music it is theatrical. There is never any cheery light hearted music. The use of such music gives the audience a heightened sense of drama. It reinforces the tense tone of the film, making the actions of the characters’ actions seems more important. For example, at 5:19, Nina riding the subway and she sees a girl, she watches hers briefly. The dramatic repetitive music score, combined with creepy sound effects and Portman’s worried face, makes the scene seem very dramatic when in fact all she is doing is watching a stranger on a train. Nina feels this way all the time, and the depiction allows the audience to be brought into her viewpoint.

The classical music contrasts with the modern, sleek style and the violent content of the film in a very interesting way. The two components juxtapose with each other at times, which makes the film feel disjointed and incohesive. This mirrors Nina’s lack of mental stability and her increasingly disjointed and incohesive mind. However, in other parts of the film, the music blends very nicely into the scene. The most obvious example of this is at 1:30:50 when Nina performs as the black swan. The way the music flows with the scene is representative of the main character, Nina’s, feelings. She is her most comfortable when she is performing on stage, because she can be perfect. Nina strives the whole film to be perfect and when she is on stage she can be, so the music reflects that. Nina’s desire to be perfect presumably comes from her controlling mother’s high expectations of her. As a result of her perfectionism she is highly strung and has a lot of anxiety. I think Arronofsky may be using this as a cautionary tale, informing the viewer of the dangers of perfectionism in a highly stylized and dramatic way.

The film’s score is interrupted from the classical music when Nina goes to a nightclub at 01:50 by some electronic dance music. The loud thumping house music is thundering rude interruption to the classical music in the rest. This huge contrast immediately informs the audience that something has changed. The crude new music makes the audience very uncomfortable, it makes the scene seem eerie and frightening, because it is so different to the rest of the film. Instead of seeing Nina out having fun for the first time, we see her in a grungy club, having sexual times with men with her mind foggy and unclear from drugs. This portrayal shows Nina’s paranoia leaking into her night on the town. She isn’t enjoying herself like Lily, she is anxious and overwhelmed. The scene makes that distinction clear and it makes the audience feel the same way as her, through the use of music. The nightclub scene is really the beginning of Nina’s swift dramatic transformation into the black swan, and the music is representative of that change. The transformation itself signifies Nina’s commitment to the role and how her paranoia and hallucinations have consumed her.

Sound effects in the film create a suspenseful feeling in the whole film. The film uses low rumblings and slightly high pitched screeches both simultaneously and separately in the film. The noises are very vague and hard to hear. This, however, does not make them any more ominous. The frightening sounds imply to the audience impending doom, as though something bad will happen. This makes the audience anxious as they fear some upcoming terrible action; thusly they feel paranoid like Nina does in the film. The film also uses sound effect to produce a creepy feeling in the film. It uses eerie sound effects, like rattling sounds while showing oversized goose bumps, to make the audience feel frightened. The sounds are peculiar and strange, it implies something supernatural or horrific. But the queer unknown sound makes the audience quiver, they are unsure of the nature of the scene. One example is at 01:06:36, where Nina is performing her black swan dance. This particular scene also uses the sound effect of a bird flapping its wings when she dances. This sound effect is just as symbolic as it is creepy, it compares the motion of Nina’s dancing to a swan flapping it wings. This furthers the idea of Nina actually becoming the black swan, of becoming her evil shadow. This is frightening to the viewer, Nina has become insane, she is out of control and her and turning into her dark doppelganger. The uses of sound effect in the film also tease the audience. Such as at 4:38 when Nina’s mother sees scratches on her back, she questions her about it but Nina but Nina dismisses it. The tease is when Erica sees the scratches; she makes a solemn face and stares coldly at her daughter. When this happens a low rumbling comes into the background, it hints at the strange and cruel relationship the mother has with her daughter. But also it makes the scene suddenly change its tone. The scene now feels sinister and dark, a total contrast to the pleasantries earlier in the scene. However, Nina dismisses it, the rumbling stops and things return to balance. But the lasting effect was that it made the audience nervous.  From that point on the film is able to control the audience with its sound effects, audience members are on the edge of their seats for the rest of the film due to the use of sound effects.